Sneak Peek

Yep. Ansel is going to be a gnome for Halloween. Ridiculous! You just have to wait for the rest of the pictures, though- and not just because I'm madly working at them while trying to pack for an out of state birthday party quick trip and clean the house for out trick-or-treating party scheduled to commence right bout the time we get home....
And it's been raining and the drier is still broken, and we haven't carved our pumpkins yet....
But, oh! my house is full of cute little gnomes, so I'm as happy as can be!

Pumpkin Patch

The Grandparents from Iowa usually visit at just the right time to go to our favorite pumpkin patch- Thompson's Farm in Naches, WA. The farmer is a funny guy, and he seems to spend his spare time fixing up old tractors, collecting farm implements, and building pumpkin cannons. Awesome! All our favorite things in one spot! It doesn't hurt that he always has someone making and selling pumpkin donuts right there. Grandpa ate 2 1/2 dozen before he tackled the 4 dozen he bought to go! The boys were in awe. And have stated their desire to be grownups so that I can't stop them from eating 30 donuts in one afternoon. Moms are so mean like that.

Did You Know?

111 pounds of grapes dries down to 4 gallons of raisins?
It takes about 30 minutes to pick that many grapes, and almost 3 days to dry each batch.
Black Manukka grapes make the world's best raisins.

Not New Furniture

The Iowa Grandparents are visiting right now- here with time for punkin chunkin, costume making, fall decorating and Halloween preparations. And in the spirit of preparing the house for their visit we recovered the dining room bench (which was tweed plaid with a giant rip so the boys could easily stick spaghetti fingers in and pull off bits of foam, you know, for fun) and the chairs (which were blue and purple chevron from 1942, probably, and, well, at least 50 years of stains). It was time.
And Joann was having a sale- I got two yards of decorator fabric for $12, instead of the $60 they were marked. And as much as I don't like Joann (for their ads, mostly- there are those emails nearly every day, and then the fliers that come way before the sale starts so I think I'm going to get that thing I want for 40% off until I get all the way to the register, past the aisle of candy, with three crying, fussy, antsy children- it's lame. Costco does the same thing.) it is practically next door, and there are always cute fabrics. And good deals.

The bench.

The top of the bench. Take a good look- by the time you see it in person it will indubitably be covered in spaghetti smears.

The fabric for the chairs.

And one of the chairs, finished!

Not quite the new dining room furniture I really want- 52"diameter round Mission or Shaker style pedestal table with leaves, simple little smooth (no grooves for goo to get stuck in) wooden chairs- but way cheaper and less hassle.

Socks for Avery

Lengthened, fiddled with, unraveled and "knitted" by a certain three year old, finally done. Um, not that he ever actually wears socks, but, well, Moms are funny like that.

Here's Lookin' At You Baby

8 Months, 4 days! How did it happen so fast? But there he is- crawling and reaching, sticking every little thing in his mouth, reaching tiny fingers in places I never even think of, let alone clean. He loves his brothers, laughs and shakes and squeals when he sees them, works hard to be where they are, to eat what they eat, to be a part of the action. He seems in such a hurry to be big like them. Silly Ansel- don't you know Mama LIKES having a baby in the house?

Sick. Fair. Rain.

Home, sick. Fevers, chills, sore throats, queasy stomachs, blood shot eyes. Poor Avery went three days without eating a single thing. Aaron was home before bedtime twice this whole week. There aren't any groceries, the house is a disaster zone, laundry is piled to the ceiling in the laundry room (where IS the maid, anyway? oh right, it's just me) and the huge box of peaches that I haven't gotten to yet is starting to smell a little... ripe.
Bummer.
I'm just hoping maybe it was swine flu and we're safe now?
Luckily he recovered just in time to go to the fair, though he didn't feel up to going on any rides that Miles wasn't also big enough to go on.
Bummer.
Well, there's always next year.
And, as usual, the last two days of the fair were rainy, grey, and cold. October is here and with it the first bites of winter coming on.
Bummer.
Oh well, we had fun, at the fair and all summer, and at least everything is getting watered really well for the end of the season, with no effort on my part. I always feel a little decadent and ridiculously suburban, turning on the underground sprinklers to water the LAWN. Seems like there's probably lots more important things in the world that water could be used for than grass. Maybe if my front yard was filled with vegetables....
Oh well, there's always next year!